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Oct. 10 Dusty Baker postgame interview

Q. What did you think about what Mike Leake gave you today in terms of effort?

DUSTY BAKER: Well, you know, he didn't start off very well in the first couple of innings, and then he settled down there.

For a couple of innings he threw the ball excellent. Those couple of innings and that one inning it only took four pitches to double, hit, another double. So he wasn't real sharp. He was getting the ball up in the middle of the plate. When he does that, general speaking, you know, like most pitchers, he gets hit. Usually his ball is down.

Like I said, he was throwing strikes. He wasn't walking them. He wasn't throwing quality strikes.

Q. Obviously coming home, is it hard to believe this series is 2-2?

DUSTY BAKER: It's probably hard for them to believe that we were up 2 0 out there. So they reversed on us what we did to them out there, and we have a big game, the rubber match, tomorrow. It won't matter, if we win tomorrow doesn't matter how many games you were up. But you know they're a quality team, and we knew it was going to be a fight when we got here.

Q. Looking forward to tomorrow, what do you say to the guys to get them fired back up, get them to get rid of the funk and move forward?

DUSTY BAKER: Yeah, it starts with the starting pitching. We feel comfortable with Latos throwing tomorrow. The main thing is we left a lot of runners on base early in the game. We had a lot of opportunities early. We had Barry Zito on the ropes quite a few times. So the main thing is just come out fightin'. That's what it's about. Tomorrow is the final fight.

Q. Did you think about taking Mike out the inning before you did?

DUSTY BAKER: Well, I mean, did you know it was going to happen during that time? You know what I mean? He was dealing during that time. You can always look back and say, hey, should you have taken him out at that time? But what if he had gone another two or three innings and dealt. It happened so quickly. You can't have somebody in the bullpen ready all the time. It takes time for the guys to warm up.

We had discussed it, but he was getting the ball down and he was getting outs. I mean, it's easy to look back now and say, yeah, you should have taken somebody out.

Q. As you look ahead to tomorrow with Mat, is there anybody else you would rather have on the mound for this decisive Game 5?

DUSTY BAKER: Well, nobody -- nobody present. You wish you had Johnny Cueto, but you don't. Right now, it's Mat's turn, and he's strong. He's on his regular turn unlike his last time out.